BACKGROUNDThis tax year I have two "after-hour" sources of earned income; one as an independent contractor for a company that will give me a 1099 Misc and the other is a home business I operated on my own as the sole worker/"employee." I exhaust the $10k deferral limit in the 401k at my day job. From your earlier answers, I understand that while I can't use a SIMPLE IRA, I am still eligible for a SEP IRA. Using 13.0435% of the combined net profits, my SEP contribution will be < $2k.

QUESTIONS1. Even though I'll file two Schedule Cs, can I still have only one SEP IRA account using a single Form 5305? (In essence treating the two sources as different "division" in the same "company"/sole proprietorship.)

2. The home business is now defunct (my business counterpart went to work full-time) and the SEP IRA contribution is small. Therefore, after I make the 1998 contbribution, can I (from an IRS perspective)then transfer most of it almost immediately to an existing self-direted IRA with the same broker in order to use the capital cost effectively in a Keystone or UG 5 strategy in the larger account? My plan is to leave a small balance to keep the SEP IRA open for 1999's contribution from independent contractor income.

(We're in a relatively high marginal bracket, and our interest in this rigamrole is to defer current taxes without incurring uneconomic fees/commissions--Waterhouse advised there is no $25 IRA termination fee if a SEP IRA is closed by transfering it to another Waterhouse IRA.)

<<BACKGROUNDThis tax year I have two "after-hour" sources of earned income; one as an independent contractor for a company that will give me a 1099 Misc and the other is a home business I operated on my own as the sole worker/"employee." I exhaust the $10k deferral limit in the 401k at my day job. From your earlier answers, I understand that while I can't use a SIMPLE IRA, I am still eligible for a SEP IRA. Using 13.0435% of the combined net profits, my SEP contribution will be < $2k.

QUESTIONS1. Even though I'll file two Schedule Cs, can I still have only one SEP IRA account using a single Form 5305? (In essence treating the two sources as different "division" in the same "company"/sole proprietorship.)>>

Yes, you may.

<<2. The home business is now defunct (my business counterpart went to work full-time) and the SEP IRA contribution is small. Therefore, after I make the 1998 contbribution, can I (from an IRS perspective)then transfer most of it almost immediately to an existing self-direted IRA with the same broker in order to use the capital cost effectively in a Keystone or UG 5 strategy in the larger account? My plan is to leave a small balance to keep the SEP IRA open for 1999's contribution from independent contractor income.>>

Again, yes you may. A SEP-IRA is just like any other traditional IRA. It may be fully or partially transferred to another IRA when you desire subject to applicable transfer/rollover rules for IRAs.